


The truth is rarely pure and never simple

by middlemarch



Category: A Discovery of Witches (TV), All Souls Trilogy - Deborah Harkness
Genre: Diana can actually act like a historian for once, F/M, Fluff and Humor, Fun, Humor, Late Night Conversations, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-18
Updated: 2019-08-18
Packaged: 2020-09-06 18:33:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20296057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/middlemarch/pseuds/middlemarch
Summary: "It is in France." Diana and Matthew actually do some proper bundling-- as proper as it can be with all the clothes on the floor and all the moonlight in France coming through the window.





	The truth is rarely pure and never simple

“Matthew? Are you awake?” Diana whispered. Since the first day they’d been at Sept-Tours and she’d heard Ysabeau call his name, she had begun to pronounce it differently, some amalgam of her American accent and the Occitan Matéu, some little magic she performed without being aware of it. She seemed to constantly find new ways to bind him to her, as if her singing blood were not enough. He turned to her, seeing her bright hair silvered in the moonlight, a glimpse of the future as she’d conjured his past.

“Yes. I’ve told you, I don’t need very much sleep.”

“Then you won’t mind if we talk?” 

“Of course not. But you’re not tired?” he said. She was so resilient, his witch, but she needed to rest, even if she wouldn’t always admit it.

“A little. But I’m not sleepy and I was wondering about the past, your past,” she said. She didn’t sound troubled, though she might have been. He resolved he would answer her as honestly as he could, would offer her as much of himself as he could. His fierce desire for her was in abeyance after their earlier intimacy and he was able to think clearly, despite her warmth and scent.

“What do you want to know?”

“I know you’ve lived through so many terrible things, terrible times. I know you’ve been hurt,” she said, contemplatively. It was the voice of the academic, one he found he’d missed, not the warrior, the lioness.

“Mm, yes.”

“Was it ever fun? Fifteen hundred years is such a long time for only despair and determination,” she said. Matthew laughed, a soft sound in the room, and pulled her closer to him. She was perched on her elbows and he had a sudden vision of her with her hair tied back in a bun, peering through spectacles, glasses she called them, inquisitive, too sharply intelligent to be merely charming.

“You think it’s a silly question?”

“No, no, it’s the perfect question. One I’ve never been asked, which makes it all the better,” he said, thinking of what to tell her.

“The first hundred years or so, I don’t recall very well. The transition was difficult for me. I grieved…poorly,” he said. Diana waited. She could be patient if she thought it worthwhile. A witch’s patience, not like his, but her own, like a glass of Burgundy, not the wind in the winter.

“Snowball fights and singing in rounds, I’ve always liked those,” he said, letting the pleasure of the memories color his voice.

“Surprise and predictability,” Diana said.

“Playing chess, teaching Marcus to play chess, and falconry. Flying kites. I once brought Maman a hat from Paris with a brim a meter wide, covered in violent red silk poppies, her face when she saw it, when she wore it,” he said. Diana laughed.

“Books. So many books. Wilde and Austen, Rostand, Sorel, Chaucer,” he said.

“Do creatures write? Or are only humans the great writers?”

“There are a few of us. Mostly demons. Witches write spells and grimoires. Vampires are made, not born; it must do something to us creatively,” he mused.

“Anything else? This all sounds so serious still,” Diana said. Matthew considered what to tell her.

“I’ve always liked puppetry, the masks, how the children accept there is someone else there so easily,” Matthew said. 

“You mean Punch and Judy shows?”

“Yes, _mon coeur_. But also the Muppets and Senor Wences. Not Charlie McCarthy,” Matthew said.

“You’re lying!” Diana exclaimed. 

“Why would I lie about this?”

“To tease me,” she said, not offended. “To see if I’m gullible enough to believe you.”

“While that might be highly entertaining, I’m not. There’s no point in lying to you, you’d know if I truly tried,” Matthew said.

“Not all witches can divine the truth so easily. Not everyone can scry or See,” Diana said.

“Not because you are a witch, albeit a gifted one. Because you are my mate, my wife. There are no secrets between us now,” Matthew said. Diana was quiet and then shifted, laid her head down on his chest where his heart beat, very slowly, for her.

“So, Kermit?”

“Animal,” he answered, stroking his hand slowly along her bare arm, listening to how her laughter changed over into something else. How fun transformed into amusement, into beguiled delight.

**Author's Note:**

> Oh, the TV version of this world is so somber and it seems like Diana has totally given up on being a historian. I decided to write something a little giddy, a little introspective, with a Diana who is more than her powers and a Matthew who gets to be something other than solemn and protective and hungry. 
> 
> Title is from Oscar Wilde.


End file.
